Luke McCaffrey

Undone said:
Yep. He had one or two passes that should have been picked off but PSU didn't have the hands. So, accuracy/decision making on where to throw and placement.
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And, I see this in just about every game with every QB.  

Yes, he needs to improve.  He has a lot of areas where he can improve to make the offense click and be more productive.  But, picking out one or two passes in a game that could/should have been more accurate, is nitpicking in my opinion.  

I was watching an NFL game the other day with Tom Brady.  He threw a pass in the end zone exactly like the one that Warner dropped in the OSU game.  Brady's WR caught it.  But, it was way behind and high for him to reach up and grab.

Burrow lived off of throwing to WRs that were smothered with coverage and his WRs went up and made a play.  

This will happen from time to time with whomever is the QB at Nebraska.

 
BigRedBuster said:
And, I see this in just about every game with every QB.  

Yes, he needs to improve.  He has a lot of areas where he can improve to make the offense click and be more productive.  But, picking out one or two passes in a game that could/should have been more accurate, is nitpicking in my opinion.  

I was watching an NFL game the other day with Tom Brady.  He threw a pass in the end zone exactly like the one that Warner dropped in the OSU game.  Brady's WR caught it.  But, it was way behind and high for him to reach up and grab.

Burrow lived off of throwing to WRs that were smothered with coverage and his WRs went up and made a play.  

This will happen from time to time with whomever is the QB at Nebraska.
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so much this!

 
MasterPulverizer said:
Does anyone have any concerns about arm strength and the quality of the balls when they're in the air?  There was one play down in the red zone where he was throwing to an open TE and barely got the ball to the goal line.  Granted, he was rolling out, but it was to his right and I don't recall there being any pressure.  Also, the one that Warner dropped in the end zone was a poorly thrown ball.  He should have caught it, but it was really wobbly, as was the pass to Allen on the 2nd or 3rd play of the game.

Not complaining about the win, or how the team played, just curious as to what everyone else thinks about these two areas.
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I don't know that I can say much either way on arm strength.  He seems be good enough on the passes he's thrown.  Obviously hasn't pushed the ball down the field much.

He doesn't seem to thrown a really tight spiral.  The pass that Warner dropped in the end zone was pretty ugly.  Not really the same thing as arm strength but not great either.

 
RedDenver said:
I mentioned this elsewhere, but LM completion percentage was 62%. There's things to critique like decision making, throwing into coverage, etc. but this idea he's inaccurate is bizarre to me.
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Yes and no.  When the vast majority of your throws are not more than 5 yards downfield, you should be completing a pretty high percentage.  

Also, one pass to Falk was pretty low and behind him but he was able to adjust and make the catch.  So it shows up as a completion but accuracy wasn't very good.  Obviously the pass to Warner is at the other end of the spectrum.

 
I think Luke's passes tend to not have much zip through the air, along with a wobble (rather than a tight spiral).  It's the opposite of Adrian, where Adrian's passes would show plenty of arm strength, but would sail and he would have trouble getting the ball "down" on deep passes.  I haven't seen enough from Luke to say how "accurate" he is, but completion percentage is not the best measure of accuracy, IMO.

I think Frost's offense can be just fine with a QB who doesn't have a rocket arm, but can make quick decisions and anticipate receivers getting open into space.  The QB definitely needs to be able to throw the ball downfield, but IMO, the success of deep passes are more on the WR getting open/creating space and less on the QB making a long throw.   

 
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Just my opinion and I'm not complaining (yet), but LM doesn't seem to throw very well on the run. When he rolls out his passes are more wobbly and not on the mark. This can be improved upon, and when he is better will make the offense more dynamic. Again just an opinion based on very limited observations.

 
Looking at it another way: completion % is a nice stat to use, but yards per attempt can give a better indication of just how far a QB is pushing the ball down the field rather than relying on boosting that completion % via checkdowns and short passes. Thus far, Luke is at 7.1 Y/A, which is...not bad. It's not top 50, but not bad. Compare that to where this offense can be at when it's truly clicking (2017 UCF), and Milton was at 10.2 Y/A. 

 
Cdog923 said:
Looking at it another way: completion % is a nice stat to use, but yards per attempt can give a better indication of just how far a QB is pushing the ball down the field rather than relying on boosting that completion % via checkdowns and short passes. Thus far, Luke is at 7.1 Y/A, which is...not bad. It's not top 50, but not bad. Compare that to where this offense can be at when it's truly clicking (2017 UCF), and Milton was at 10.2 Y/A. 
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Yards per attempt is my favorite statistic to use when analyzing the efficiency of a passing game, especially over the course of a season.

 
jager said:
Just my opinion and I'm not complaining (yet), but LM doesn't seem to throw very well on the run. When he rolls out his passes are more wobbly and not on the mark. This can be improved upon, and when he is better will make the offense more dynamic. Again just an opinion based on very limited observations.
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Yeah, I was just getting to this play.  Not trying to pick on the kid but this is about as easy of a rollout pass as you can get and he misses badly.  To a 6-8 guy.


 
Mavric said:
Yes and no.  When the vast majority of your throws are not more than 5 yards downfield, you should be completing a pretty high percentage.
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Agreed, but I'm pushing back on the "Luke is inaccurate" talking point. There just isn't evidence of that since he's completing about what you'd expect.

 
RedDenver said:
Agreed, but I'm pushing back on the "Luke is inaccurate" talking point. There just isn't evidence of that since he's completing about what you'd expect.
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But completion percentage isn't the entire story.  It's a lot easier to complete a higher percentage when you're mainly throwing really short passes.  So just because it's what you might expect doesn't mean it's really all that great.

 
RedDenver said:
Agreed, but I'm pushing back on the "Luke is inaccurate" talking point. There just isn't evidence of that since he's completing about what you'd expect.
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Mavric said:
But completion percentage isn't the entire story.  It's a lot easier to complete a higher percentage when you're mainly throwing really short passes.  So just because it's what you might expect doesn't mean it's really all that great.
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Which is why....

Cdog923 said:
Looking at it another way: completion % is a nice stat to use, but yards per attempt can give a better indication of just how far a QB is pushing the ball down the field rather than relying on boosting that completion % via checkdowns and short passes. Thus far, Luke is at 7.1 Y/A, which is...not bad. It's not top 50, but not bad. Compare that to where this offense can be at when it's truly clicking (2017 UCF), and Milton was at 10.2 Y/A. 
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Thought McCaffrey did an excellent job of recovering the 2 bad snaps (that I counted) from Jurgens that easily could have been fumbles/turnovers.  This offense still has some key issues that need addressed including much needed experience.  At this point Jurgens has no excuse.  Come on man.


 
Mavric said:
But completion percentage isn't the entire story.  It's a lot easier to complete a higher percentage when you're mainly throwing really short passes.  So just because it's what you might expect doesn't mean it's really all that great.
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I'm not making the argument that his accuracy is "really all that great"; I'm arguing against the claim that he's inaccurate as the evidence doesn't support that claim.

 
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